


Let's Take The Long Way Home

by aintweproudriff



Series: Race, Spot, Albert, and Elmer [13]
Category: Newsies (1992), Newsies - All Media Types, Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken
Genre: M/M, Multi, Prompt Fill, and now hes pretty lucky, elmer just had a huge crush okay, i still just write cheesy stuff what else is new
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-04
Updated: 2017-11-04
Packaged: 2019-01-29 04:31:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12623248
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aintweproudriff/pseuds/aintweproudriff
Summary: Spot, Race, Albert, and Elmer meet an old friend and do some catching up."One day further down the road... if I pass by you on a busy street, will you remember me?"





	Let's Take The Long Way Home

**Author's Note:**

> @anita what would i do without you  
> aaa i love this prompt but it was hard to write for some reason. frikken writers block.

The sun was hot on their skin on one of the last warm days of the year. Soon, snow would be falling and days would be short. But for now, their little section of the park was warm and bright, bathed in yellow light. 

Albert ran at top speed towards the bench where they usually sat, throwing himself down on the seat. Race laughed, and the sound boomed across the grass, filling the silence of the empty park. Spot, behind the two boys, smiled at Elmer next to him and marveled at the lack of people. Not that he would have changed it, of course. It meant that the four of them could sit and enjoy it while it lasted, either in silence or - not. 

“So my Spanish teacher was just quizzing me on you guys in Spanish, and obviously he enjoys embarrassing us, making us talk in a language we don’t know and talk about something personal,” Albert was explaining, his hands moving animatedly around his face, “but he kept using feminine words!” 

Spot rolled his eyes, making a frustrated sound from the back of his throat. 

“And I tried to correct him, like gently,” Albert laughed, “but he just thought I had it wrong. And I was like, ‘no, pretty sure I know this one, actually.’”

“You know Spanish real well though,” Elmer shook his head. “Does your teacher think you’re that bad at it?”

Albert shrugged. “I mean,” he breathed out deeply, frustrated at the memory, “maybe? I speak it well but I don’t write it well so that could be why he thinks I dunno what I’m doin.’” 

Spot hummed in understanding, remembering when he’d had the same problem in the language classes he’d taken in high school, and feeling lucky that he didn’t have to deal with continuing in a language. He could basically speak Italian, that was about all he needed. 

They fell silent, thinking of the way the sunlight spotted the ground and the distant sound of cars, when a dog bark sounded nearby. 

Race was the first to turn his head and look, getting quickly excited over a dog. Spot and Albert mimicked the motion, and Elmer turned his head last; he was much more of a cat person. Which was why none of them expected Elmer to jump up from the bench and get to the dog as fast as he could. He fell to his knees and laughed in the face of the dog, a beautiful akita mix. The dog jumped on him, putting his paws on Elmer’s shoulders as Elmer frantically looked for a tag for the dog. 

“Gus!” he shouted gleefully, as the dog licked his face. “Oh my god!”

Elmer turned around to his boyfriends, who stared on in confusion. 

“I know this dog!” Elmer tried to explain. “This is Gus, he belongs to-”

“Oh my god. Elmer?” a voice sounded from behind the dog.

The four of them looked up to see a boy, panting and out of breath, dressed in a t-shirt and jeans. He was tired and sweaty, as was visible when he stood up straighter and pushed his blonde hair back with his hand. But the smile on his face was genuine, and only beat by the one Elmer was wearing. 

“Alex!” Elmer jumped up, flinging his arms around the newcomer. The boy, Alex, was taken aback and almost knocked over by the force of the hug, but hugged back intensely after regaining his balance. 

“Elmer oh my god, hi!” he stood back and put his hands on Elmer’s forearms, still grinning. The dog barked and ran around, sniffing at Elmer’s feet and legs. 

Elmer stepped back, laughing into the air. “You guys, do you remember Alex?” he looked his boyfriends in the eyes, looking for some kind of recognition. “He went to highschool with us.”

Spot, Race, and Albert exchanged looks. 

“No, sorry,” Race cringed, “I don’t think I knew you.”

Elmer shoved Race’s shoulder and gave him a look that told Race that even if he didn’t remember Alex, he was supposed to lie about it. Race shrugged, putting on his best innocent face. 

“No, no,” Alex laughed. “I get it, honestly. I only had a few classes with Spot, and like one with Race. Not sure I knew Albert at all, actually. And uh, you three were kind of absorbed in each other during high school.”

Elmer covered his mouth to keep himself from laughing outright, and Race put his hand over his heart, feigning offense. 

“That’s probably true,” Spot nodded, smiling and sticking his tongue out ever so slightly. 

Alex moved his hand in a half-shrug. “Can’t imagine having had a class with all three of you in it. If the way you sat on each other in the lunchroom was any indication, a class with all of you would be hell.”

Albert nodded, chuckling nostalgically. “Yeah, senior year art class.”

“We all needed a last minute art credit,” Race expanded. 

“And all three of us passed with Ds, just enough to get the credit,” finished Spot. “That poor teacher.”

Elmer smiled and watched as Albert named the teacher, feeling sorry for her. 

Alex opened his mouth, closed it, then nodded to himself and opened it again. “So, are the four of you like, together now?” He asked, his fingers fiddling anxiously. 

Elmer, in answer, reached for the hand that was nearest to him, which happened to be Race’s. The other three did the same, almost instantly, until they were all linking hands. Alex clapped his hands and squeezed his eyes shut happily. Gus ran to his feet and sat down, his tail wagging. 

“That’s awesome, oh my gosh,” Alex tossed his head back. “I’m so happy for you guys. Sure took you long enough!”

Spot dropped Albert’s hand in order to hold his own out in front of him. “Wh- Hold on. What do you mean it took us long enough?”

“Well, you know-”

“Al?” Elmer interrupted, and Albert looked up before realizing he was speaking to Alex and not him. “Do we really need to talk about this? I mean, y’know. It’s over. Let’s talk about you!” He put his hand on Alex’s shoulder. “It’s been like three years. Are you dating anyone?”

“Come on, El!” Alex pleaded sarcastically. “Let me answer poor Spot’s question. He’s so confused!” 

Spot raised his eyebrows, and Elmer threw up his hands. 

“Fine! That’s alright!” Elmer gave up, but he smiled. “Let’s just go through all of everything that happened in high school.”

Albert, Spot, and Race looked at each other, asking silently if they knew anything about this, and coming to the collective agreement that they didn’t understand. 

“Well, Elmer used to have the biggest crush on you guys, back in high school,” Alex said, smiling devilishly. “You guys, probably knew that, right? More or less?”

Race laughed. “Aw, El, you had a crush on us? You’re adorable.”

“Race,” Elmer touched his hand to his cheek, “not only do I know you’re just quoting a meme, but you also knew that already, and we’ve been dating because of it for a while.”

Race coughed. “Yeah, but still.” 

“Anyway though,” Alex waved his hand, “he was just so like, in love with you guys, for almost the last three years of school. God! The amount of times I heard about you three, and how cute you were,” Alex raised one eyebrow at Elmer, who blushed. “I almost went insane.”

Elmer looked up at his boyfriends, who smiled at him lovingly. 

Alex paused. “Actually,” he tilted his head, “you know how it all started?”

“No, how?” Spot nodded.

“Oh no, no, no,” Elmer held his hands out in front of him, shaking them vigorously. “That’s where I draw the line, okay?”

Race leaned forward. “How’d it all start, Alex?”

“Oh my god, okay so, it was freshman year, and we were in the same newspaper class, right? And I was totally alone, didn’t have any friends. When in comes this cute fucker,” Alex put his hand over his face, rubbing at his mouth, “who also had no friends. And we were both kinda dorky, kinda nerdy. So I asked him out, about December of that year.”

Albert’s mouth dropped open. 

“It was super fast!” Alex nearly shouted. “It didn’t last longer than two weeks-”

“Eleven days, actually-” Elmer cringed. 

“-okay, eleven days,” Alex shook his head. “We were like, ‘hmmm, this isn’t working.’ And so we broke up, mutually, and became friends instead. It was super good, because we got along super well, but neither of us knew what we were doing romantically.”

Elmer nodded. “I still don’t, actually,” he shrugged.

Albert broke up everyone else’s soft laughter with a question. “Uh, Alex? What’s the best embarrassing story you could tell us about El? For scientific purposes.”

“Why the hell would you ask that, Al?” Elmer hit his shoulder. 

“...For science.”

“Duh,” Race supplemented. 

“You’re not a part of this,” Elmer pointed a flustered finger at him.

Alex pondered the question, one hand scratching Gus’s head and the other on his hip. 

“Oh. Oh my god,” he closed his eyes and smiled evilly. “This one’s a little sad, actually, but I think it’s funny now that you four are finally together.”

Elmer glared suspiciously, and Alex laughed. 

“You’re about to be so pissed at me,” he looked at Elmer and put his hands in his pockets. “So El and I, we used to have these sleepovers. They were super fun, we’d do them all the time during high school.”

Elmer groaned and covered his face with his right hand. “Yep, second Friday of every month.”

Albert gasped. “We used to do sleepovers the FIRST Friday of every month!” he gestured to Spot, Race, and himself.

“Yeah, we knew that,” Alex nodded, his expression irritated. “And we - Elmer, really - wanted to keep the first Friday of the month open all the time, in case he ever was lucky enough to be invited to one.”

“Yeah, that never happened,” Elmer shoved Race’s shoulder gently. 

“No, it didn’t,” Alex allowed. “But, second Friday of every month, we were hanging out! And it was usually fun, but uh,” he coughed, “sometimes Elmer would get a little upset over things - usually you three - and he would, uh,”

“Don’t you fucking dare expose me like this,” Elmer whispered.

“Elmer would start crying a little bit, or a lot, and he’d get really angry or kinda shut down.”

Elmer looked at his boyfriends through the top of his eyes, making it look like he was still looking at the ground. The three of them all had their eyebrows knitted together. Spot’s hand was on his chin, and Race was hugging himself tightly while Albert leaned forward. 

“We had a lot of nights,” Alex finished, solemnly, “where Elmer wouldn’t - or couldn’t - stop talking about how apparently he wasn’t right for you guys or he wasn’t good enough for you guys, or whatever. Those were the nights we broke out the ice cream and the cheesy movies, and tried not to think about you. Do you know how hard it is to find a movie that doesn’t have romance? Because I do. When any little romantic thing was enough to set him off, I had to know where to find movies without romance.” 

“Oh my god, Alex,” Race breathed at the same time Spot said: “Oh my god, Elmer.”

Elmer shrugged. Alex’s phone dinged with a notification. 

“Oh, fuck,” he laughed. “I didn’t even realize how late it was. That’s my boyfriend,” he explained to the four boys in front of him, “he’s worried about me, so I should get home.”

Alex dropped to his knees to put Gus’s leash back on, and stood up when he heard Spot speak. 

“Alex, you’re a good friend.”

“He is,” Elmer smiled. “We should catch up sometime, okay?”

Alex nodded. “Yeah, for sure. And, uh, you know what?” he asked Spot, Race, and Albert. “You’re good boyfriends. To- to Elmer, not to me.”

Race’s shoulders bounced as he laughed. 

Alex took a deep breath. “Stay that way, alright? Because honest to god, if I ever have to break out the ice cream and romance-free movies for this kid again, I will fight someone.”

Elmer chuckled, hiding the red on his cheeks. “Spot’d win in a fight, you know.”

Albert coughed. “Will do, boss,” he saluted Alex in a silly way, but everyone could tell he meant it. 

“We don’t have any intention of not bein’ good boyfriends to him, okay?” Race defended himself. “But, I guess that if we ever did fuck up,” he dropped his shoulders, “I’m happy to know he’s gonna have someone to go to.”

Alex smiled. In that moment, Elmer noticed just how young Alex still looked, and remembered every time he’d smiled at him before. It was good to see something so familiar. 

“I’ve gotta run, guys,” Alex waved. “It was real good to see you again.”

“You too!” Elmer called after him, watching Alex and Gus make their way away. 

Race cleared his throat once Alex was out of sight. “So, you were, like, in love with us?”

“Well, believe it or not,” Elmer tilted his chin upwards, “I still am, like, in love with you. And I pretty proud of it too.”

“We’re pretty proud of it too,” Race laughed. 

Albert took Race’s hand, but looked at Elmer. “Yeah, and I’m glad you didn’t end up with Alex!” he said, and the sun finally set for the night.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Leave a comment (preferably a kind one) or kudo if you liked it!


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